


Wolves

by eighthirteen



Category: Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Angst, Canon Divergence, Coda Fix-It fic, F/M, Internal Monologue, POV Multiple, Post-Apocalypse, Road Trips, Slow Build, Southern Gothic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-19
Updated: 2015-09-28
Packaged: 2018-02-09 12:10:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 28
Words: 8,883
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1982469
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eighthirteen/pseuds/eighthirteen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After one group gets caught in Terminus, the others fend for themselves. They reflect on the past and the relationships they've forged.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Daryl

**Author's Note:**

> We're survivors, he told her across the floor of the lamp.
> 
> Survivors? she said.
> 
> Yes.
> 
> What in God's name are you talking about? We're not survivors. We're the walking dead in a horror film. 
> 
> \-- Cormac McCarthy, _The Road_

The air is stagnant with the remains of arrested motion.  Dust on furniture, condensation from the rain, carbon dioxide from people’s last breaths.

 _Find anything?_ she says.  

 _Naw_ , I answer.

We haven’t eaten in around eighteen hours.  That's my guess.  Last night, I managed to catch something and we stopped to cook the meat, barely, before I made us move on.  I just had that feeling.  The sun had already passed its highest point when we stumbled onto this place.  A few strikes against the front doorjamb roused two walkers.  One for each of us, her and me.  Usually we are outnumbered, disproportionately partnered, in this strange dance of killing the undead.  Now we have earned the right to eat, if we can find any food.

She turns to me and holds out an aluminum cylinder.  One can of beans. We’ll need a drink.  I open the refrigerator, whose rotting odor makes even me grimace, and she turns her head away.  I spy plastic bottles in the back and start pulling things out.  

 _I’ll help_ , she says, but I shake my head. Nearly every day, I’ve watched her impale corpses and showed her things like entry angles and knife twists for delivering the fatal wound, but I don’t feel the same about rummaging through trash like this.

 _Yeah!_ I say.  Two half-drunk bottles of green and blue sports drink.  Good enough.  I pluck them out and turn around.

No one else is in the kitchen.  I am alone.  

I charge toward the porch and cry, _Beth!_   I am running on the road now, yelling her name.  My heart thuds inside my ribcage, my eardrums, my skull.  I can't breathe for the adrenaline and abandonment choking my throat.

Then I am sitting up, hearing myself say her name.  I haven’t yelled out the way I dreamed and the others still sleep.  Except two. Their outlines shift toward me.  Moonlight through a crack illuminates Glenn, and the sympathy in his face makes me wince.

I want to defend myself against the anguish in Maggie’s.  She can't pretend defiance, the willfulness with which she is normally infused.

Nothing I can say will better our spirits, only doing something will.  Right now, that seems damn near impossible.


	2. Beth

Something purrs in my ears. I try to pinpoint the source but there is no one, it just surrounds me. I lie on my back, my arms tingle beneath me, but I sense in my body the pull of forward motion.

Then my eyes open and the meaning of where I am slams through me. Before I can force my body to move, I look down to confirm I am clothed. Daylight illuminates the man at the wheel. No one is next to him. My wrists are not bound, but I'm afraid to free them in case he hears their scrape against the floor.

And I plead silently, _Please let him be safe, please let him make it, God!_ When I told Daryl he would be last man standing, I never pictured him overcome by walkers. I paired him against the Governor, compared his invincibility against that crazed animal who murdered Daddy and humiliated Maggie.

The strange taste before vomiting rises in my throat.

_Look alive, Greene. You ain’t dead yet. This the best you can do?_

I know what he would say. So I do not let my body betray me. Instead, when my stomach clenches, I lift up and retch over the front seat, covering the man’s torso and spattering his face. He yells and slams the brakes. I whip forward against the headrest but find a handhold before my body crashes into the side window. The hearse skids and turns towards the edge of the road. My eyes tear, and pain shoots through my head and injured foot, but I see my gun and Daryl’s knife in the front seat. I reach over, grab the weapons and slam back against the window. As the car spins to a stop, I bring the gun to the man’s head.

 _Take me back_ , I say.


	3. Daryl

In the morning, Abraham and I make everyone stretch and do something against hunching and cramping, stale air and darkness. Glenn says they've only eaten cereal. I'm pretty sure no one would turn down a squirrel now.

Midway through, Sasha crumples. I think she's done in, but she kneels and lifts her head, addressing Rick. _What's the point. Is there even a plan?_ she says.

Since that night on the road, I have not seen Rick falter, but he is convinced by something I don't understand. Blind assurance is not what Sasha needs, though. It'd be arrogant to discount her despair.

Michonne crouches and touches Sasha's shoulder. _I feel like crying, too_ , she says. It's one of those times when she redeems every moment of distrust she directs toward the universe.

 _But we don't get to do that_ , she finishes.

My eyes meet Maggie's. How many times have she and I heard those words, a law of life these Greenes must have inherited from Hershel.

Sasha gets up. _Back to the drawing board_ , she says.


	4. Beth

At any moment, this man can fling up an arm, jerk the car into motion, fell me to the floor. Every other adversary we’ve met had one last move, one stunning encore fatal to our own. T-Dog. Lori. Andrea. Daddy.

But this man takes his hands off the wheel. The pulse throbs in his throat before he swallows and says, _I haven’t harmed you_.

I press the gun deeper into his temple and say, _You took me away from the one person I had. I left him to die!_

 _You were being swarmed_ , he says. _You thought I was one of them and fought me off, and I knocked you out by mistake._

We don’t speak for a few seconds. I can’t move without losing contact between him and my gun. But there is nothing more I can possibly lose.


	5. Maggie

When Daryl told me what happened, I felt too much at once. I pushed him against the wall and said, _How could you?_

My parents never warned what a sister would do to me. They never told me the way I saw her then is how I always see her now. The first time she rode a horse alone or when she sang at the school concert. On the outside she was all delicate strength, but I could only see that round baby girl clapping her hands, reaching out, pressing her cheek against mine.

I wonder if Merle ever looked that way at Daryl. If he did, it can’t have been for long.

Later, Glenn told me I had been too hard on him.

_You don't get to say that_ , I said. _She’s my sister. Your sister, too._

He put his arms around me and said, _You can’t blame him more than he blames himself. Same way you're blaming yourself_.

I couldn't talk for awhile. I just managed to say, _If there was one person I thought could keep her safe_.

_There aren’t many people I trust more_ , he said.

I know what he’s doing, but he and Daryl were grown men when they met her. They’ll never see what I see in my sister.


	6. Beth

We follow railroad tracks, maybe the same ones Daryl and I met when I made him start tracking the others. When I broke down seeing the horde and he said nothing. We moved around each other so carefully then, as if we were both encased in glass, afraid to shatter the other.

The man passes signs I haven't seen before. _Slow down_ , I say, digging the gun deeper.

 _I can tell you what they say_. _Sanctuary for all. Community for all. Those who arrive survive_.

Words of comfort like Daddy might have said or Rick when he took in the Woodbury people.

 _W_ _hy aren’t you there?_  

He says slowly, _They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inside they are ravening wolves_.

I hesitate.   _How do you know that verse?_  

He doesn’t respond. I shift my legs and pray my strength will hold.

 

I sight something at the vanishing point of the road. When the man slows down, I don’t object. I tell him to open all the windows and watch his hands.

Then I yell, _Carol, Ty!_ I don't know whether they can tell it's me, but Tyreese hands something to Carol and takes a stance with the gun. I shout until he stands outside the driver’s window pointing it inside, then I stumble out.

 _Oh, Beth_ , says Carol. She puts down her bundle and catches me.

I want so bad to collapse into her arms and stay there, but I jerk my head towards the car. We bring up our guns and aim them towards the man. Tyreese kicks his legs out.  

 _You hurt her?_   he says.

 _No._ _I swear, I never meant her harm_. The man looks up at me. _Please tell them_.

 _He took me away from Daryl_. _We were in a house together when walkers came through. He grabbed me away and knocked me out._

I turn back to Carol.  _We have to go back_. _If anyone can make it, you know it’s him_.

Her eyes are bleak. _We haven’t met anyone else so far_ , she says.

I just repeat, _Please, please, please_. I don’t need to beg because I know she would never let us leave him behind. I’m just saying the words for both of us.


	7. Carol

I give her the baby while Tyreese and I tie up the man and settle him into the car. She buries her nose in Judith’s neck and says, _Sweet girl_.

I don’t know if our children will ever forgive us. We seem to be swindling the few we have left into a pretense of life, when the only destination is inevitable.

When we get to the house, Beth exits first, limping toward a walker in the trees. I sprint after her, but she’s already lunged, burying her knife into its head. Before we go further, Tyreese grabs my arm.

 _Someone has to keep watch_ , he says, an edge lining his voice.

 _That man's not going anywhere without the car keys._ _We all go. We're not dividing up_ , I say.

Beth looks between the two of us and seems to wait for a signal. When there is none, she raps on the front doorway, but nothing appears. I’m not sure what we’re looking for and, behind me, Tyreese murmurs, _You know he’d rather end it himself if things went south_.

Tyreese is still a few steps behind us when it attacks. The hardest part always is not panicking, not letting their flailing limbs distract you. I fling its arms away and stab it through the eye.

It's not Daryl.

Once we’ve gathered ourselves, Beth leads us downstairs, kneels beneath tables, and looks behind corners. Bodies litter the floor.

I put my hand on her shoulder. _He might have gone outside_ , I say, past the heaviness in my chest.

She shakes her head. _There were too many_. _If he got hurt in here, he wouldn’t have made it out_.

Now I begin to understand. We haven’t seen the crossbow.

When we get back outside, Tyreese opens the door, and we look at the man slumped against the seat. _Do we continue?_ he says.


	8. Daryl

Every hour, two of them circle the car. The others have been here one night.

 _We wouldn't lower our weapon_ s, Tara says. _Abraham wouldn't let us._

The man so named says, _No reason. Friendly people don't make you lay down arms_.

I wonder if Abraham judges us for giving Gareth a chance. I have a feeling he and I wouldn't get along on the outside.

 _Something happened here_ , Rick says. _They weren't prepared to kill, not yet_.

 _They can't keep us forever_ , says Bob. _That's a waste of energy and food_.

Haven't we done this before, weighed those against us? After we settled at the prison, maybe Rick lost too much to confront the fact of human nature, which can be just sheer fuckery. Myself, I never tried to reason what made the Governor different from the other assholes I had known. I just knew he needed to hurt or kill, and my goal then was to stop either. That's who I thought I was, someone who believed the worst of everyone.

 _We have one chance_ , Rick says. _When they come for us_.


	9. Gabriel

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains implied violence against women.

_The Old Testament says, for every sin, there is retribution, but I believed more than this. I believed redemption was truth. Receiving mercy, granting it, and transforming oneself through the gift._

_I couldn't say this to Gareth when the men came and broke him in. There are ways to break a man without touching him, and no man should watch what they did outdoors in turns to his wife. Afterwards, the one they called ringleader moved her aside and said to him, An offering, Gareth. Consider it your first tithe._

_He stayed out there for hours while the rest of us crept into shelter and choked on cowardice until the gunshot rang. When he came to us, he fell on his knees and said, I have always been weak. I have always sought the least resistance and now I have truly paid._

_I don't judge the walkers for their soulless cravings. I understood that day, as I never had before, the downfall in the Garden. The acts we commit with knowledge become our worst sins._


	10. Carol

A few feet away, the man sits propped against the car, his arms bound behind him. Beth gazes into the darkness around us. And I begin talking.

I tell Beth first about the rats, then of the game with the walker and Mika’s inability to fire a gun. I tell her of Lizzie holding a knife over the body and my relief seeing Judith unharmed, a relief separate and unassuaged by the decision Tyreese and I make next. To take a life for a life, or, to take a life in service of others' lives. It is too utilitarian. There is no logic. I begin each morning with the same thought: all I wanted was my daughter to live.

Beth kneels and presses her hands against her mouth. On the farm and in the prison, the girls leaned more to action, each in her own way, but they also knew the grace of listening to the cares of others. And she is Hershel's daughter. She has no choice but to absorb this nightmare, as we do in these times, too assaulted to understand whether the atrocity reforges or corrupts us.

One thing I do not tell.  Tyreese's mercy, or the reason I still live.  We listen to the fire splutter and crackle . . .  

Then I think telling her is a mistake because of the men who appear at the edge of the firelight, six of them with weapons. The three of us scramble up, me with the baby, into a cornered circle, back to back. Judith wakes and whimpers.

 _You're a long way from home, Gabriel_ , says one, crossing over and cutting his ropes. Gabriel rolls back his shoulders, chafes his wrists, nods his head toward us. 

 _And now it comes to pass_ , he says _. Another choice. You all could die right now. But these men only need one.  One girl._

Behind me, Beth says something I can't hear. She exhales, shakes her head, then repeats it.

_Gabriel, if that's who you are.  If I go.  Where do you take them after I leave?_

_We go to Terminus_.

 _Where the wolves are_.

He bows his head and says, _I am one of them. If I bring them with me, they live_.

 _You don't have to do this!_ I cry. _There's another way._

Tyreese laughs. He says, _Brother, this is no choice. This is bullshit_.

_You're right. This is not a true choice. These men could kill you all here. What would be the point of killing you separately?_

_To get to our girl_ , Tyreese forces out.

Gabriel shakes his head.   _How long have you been in these woods?_   _Where were your people before then? Have you seen the signs?_

He knows we've seen them. We were headed there before Beth held a gun to his head and called our names from the car.

 _You have no reason to trust me_. _It is a blind decision. But what kind of decisions have we made? All of us. What decision did you make when you shot that girl?_

Inside, I feel something fracturing. It's me.  I've lost.

I whisper, _Lizzie hurt others. It was for the greater good_.

Beth bends, lays down the gun, and breaks our circle. She faces us and presses her hands together, this time to stop their trembling.

 _That is our deal_ , Gabriel says.


	11. Daryl

_Stop pacing. You're using up your energy_ , Rick says.

If he thought Carl had a sure chance when we were ambushed, he would have let Carl go, but I know he called for him so they could face at least the certainty of imprisonment together. But I don't have that luxury.

In my life, there was a time when I was whipped, when I did not yet have the strength to overpower Dad. Merle had left and was spreeing with his friends. I had just a disintegrating roof over my head.

After Mom died, I was gone. I was still a kid, but I had some things going for me. My bones and muscles fell in line and spoke for me when words never could. I made myself useful to Merle and didn't say much around his friends who were older and unpredictable. Knowing when to shut up is crucial.

Loss is relative, I think. Maybe I could have mourned how things should have been except I saw no different around me. They say chimps and humans nurture their young the longest to prepare them for survival. The people I knew were less evolved.

That night at the cabin, after I hurled everything Beth was into her face, and we sank into a drunken mellowness in which I made no clear apology, she said I was made for how things are. I thought about setting her straight. She said what she took for granted were what Hershel and Maggie and her dead brother had given her, but what I learned every day at the farm and in the prison was the opposite. What I provided these people was creating in me the birthright I never received. They reinstated it so gradually, I did not realize what it was until I failed them.

The first few days, I could not bear her because she was the reminder. The core of goodness automatic in her life had manifested in mine before atomizing. I tell you this: I understood the loss more fully than I ever did the change that wrought the surplus.

She took that away from me, too. Of course, she needed me, but she also knew what she would not endure, and in showing me the disparity, which to her was my true failure, not the other, the bitterness began dissipating. I didn't even want to resist. I wanted to exist inside that expectation and trust, and my ability to return it was strange and new and satisfying.

I've stopped pacing. Which gives Rick and me a few seconds before the door creaks, the crack in the wall widens, and smoke fills the car.

Abraham yells, _Go!_ And I do. Once again, I am gone.


	12. Beth

What I learn is that the body in fear eliminates any impurity weighing it down. I was sick over Gabriel, and now, in my eighteenth year of life, I could soil my clothes. I don't want to die in shame, without dignity.  I tell myself to remember the women I've known. Andrea in the woods where Michonne found her. Michonne fending off the world with a blade. Lori telling Maggie to cut her open. Maggie in a room with the Governor. Carol lost until Daryl came.

This last memory is a mistake: I know he won't come for me now. But he thought I was worth abiding with.

The men peel away abruptly, and I am left with one, who secures my hands. We walk into the back of a truck, where he blindfolds me. I sit in darkness, my tears soaking through the fabric, struggling to contain myself.

 _Please say something_. _Anything. I need to know someone is there_.

I hear the crunch of wheels over dirt, the susurration of his hands against the wheel.

 _What is your name_ , he says finally.

I don't know what he means. He was there when Gabriel named me.

 _Beth?_ I say, but he responds, _That's not your name. That's not who you are_.

I thought about this when Daryl and I were running. When I saw his disdain, when he withdrew from any attempt to thwart the nothingness threatening to diminish us, I knew who I was not. I said this to him outside the cabin, enunciating the words with pain and rage, stripping to my most vulnerable self, so that he would not have the satisfaction of thinking I had any delusions.

I did not anticipate clarity about who I am in those raving moments. A girl who cares for babies and music. Whose sister seeks her through a wall during a plague. A girl who pledges her fate away, overlooked in this overturned world.

Suddenly, I know the answer. _I have no name_ , I tell the man. _I am no one_.

He drives on. He says, _Your type is hard to find_.


	13. Carol

Life retains a certain order even while ceasing sense or reason.  The baby must eat.  The baby must live.  One lives for the baby.  So we tend to the baby, even while Tyreese and I reel from the loss.

 _Something's wrong_ , Tyreese says. _Hear that?_

The report of gunshots and detonations. Gabriel turns the car off the road and heads toward higher ground. He pulls alongside a chain-link fence.

 _This place is going to shit_ , Tyreese says.

 _They're having trouble with a group_ , Gabriel answers.   _They're resisting_.

We should get out of here and leave this fight among strangers.  But a man steps out from the shadow of a tree and hails Gabriel, who motions us out of the car.

The man stares. _Gabriel, you can't bring a baby here!_ he says.

 _We made a deal_ , he answers.

The man is almost mute with horror.  He steps back, shakes his head, waves his hands.   _You can't_.   _We can't_.

 _Hey!_ Tyreese says, advancing on Gabriel. _Our girl gave herself up for this. What the hell is going on!_

I can see the figures running through the buildings, dodging gunfire, sheltering behind corners. _Tyreese, it's them_ , I say.

He draws near and looks down through the links. _For God's sake_.


	14. Daryl

There was a teacher in the high school whose class I sat in sometimes. She was quiet except when she talked stories; then her eyes would widen and her hands would move in the air and the words she used made the characters real and close.

The one I always remember was Achilles. The teacher said his story began in the middle, straight into the action, and the first word was what Achilles felt until his role was over and done.

 _Rage_. Achilles felt rage. His king took the girl he claimed, and he raged so hard he wouldn't fight, not until the enemy killed his friend. Then he re-entered the fray to kill his friend's murderer, and when he did, he dragged the corpse behind a chariot for nine days, desecrating it against the customs of the land.

 _It does matter_ , Beth said when I pointed out they were just dead walkers. She was so convinced of the wrongness and dead set against the futility. _Don't you think it's beautiful?_ she asked.

I've been trapped too long in dark dreams of her. Now, with sunlight hitting my eyes and smoke burning my throat, I come alive with sensation. My fists thud into flesh, and the cries of pain bring me almost unbearable relief. I am hurt, and hurting these others is glory. Again and again, I seek the next objects of my rage.

I don't remember the others until I hear my name shouted. I turn and see Glenn and Rick and Bob being wrestled to the ground. Abraham looks at me. We're outnumbered. The others are nowhere to be seen.

 _Hands up_ , comes the voice. _Nothing personal, you understand._

 

We bend forward with hands bound and backs bent forward in submission. I taste blood and surrender to the pain spreading through my limbs.

In the moment you go, you seek the girl who trusted you with her life because what gift do you then understand more. The things I would have said. Please live. Please don't die. Please stay alive so I know something worthwhile remains, something more than mere brutality. That was my role, and now it is done.

Gareth leans over. _I just want you to understand, none of this was personal_ , he says. He motions to the people behind us.

He keeps saying that. He keeps talking when I crave silence to grieve for the future. I would tell him to shut the fuck up and let us die in peace if I weren't gagged, so I am surprised to hear Bob, his words tumbling over each other.

 _You don't have to do this! We can put the world back to what it was_.

Gareth's head snaps up. _Nothing can go back to what it was_.

 _No! We have a man who has a cure. We just have to get him to Washington_.

 _You'll say anything now_ , Gareth says.

But even with my head forced down, I know Bob’s words have rippled through the room. Because we are all liars. We have all told strangers, you are safe with us, we will not hurt you if you follow our rules. But we dissemble based on one straight truth: we are who we are because of the undead. Without them, there is no need for the walls and weapons dividing us.

 _We never wanted to hurt you_ , Gareth says and signals.

But one of the men grabs Gareth, and I feel the gag loosen and the restraints on my wrists shedding. I don't know what's happening, so I turn around and aim for the man behind me, but he retreats and holds up his hands. Beside me, Rick, Glenn, Abraham, and Bob face off against the crowd. The people next to us are still trussed up.

 _What the hell is going on!_ Gareth yells, his face reddening, but his captor holds fast.

One of the men steps forward. _You were making the wrong choice. You have been for awhile_.

 _We all promised!_ Gareth says.

 _We first always_ , the man answers. _It's time we did that_.

 _We have news from Gabriel_ , says another. _He's with people who were with them, and now they say there's a cure_.

Them. Us. It's happening too fast for me to believe.

 _Why are you doing this?_ Rick asks the crowd. _This is your group_.

For a few moments, they are silent. When the first man speaks, his voice breaks.

 _Your people have a baby_.

Rick steps back. _A baby_.

The man nods. _Less than a year old. Born after the turn_.

He is different from the creature who ripped out Jeff's neck to save Carl. He is almost serene. He rubs his hands over his eyes, then over his hair and beard. And falls to his knees.

 _Thank you, Lori_ , he says.


	15. Beth

They are all girls in uniforms. A girl who points me to the shower and waits for me to strip. I can't help closing my eyes and succumbing to the warm water pouring over my skin and rinsing away the layers of grit and sweat and vomit and tears. The water runs gray down the drain.

But she is watching, so I dry off and put on the cotton gown. Another girl takes my temperature, presses a gauge against my bicep, and tries to draw blood from my right elbow but frowns when I wince at the pressure. She splints it and takes blood from my left arm instead. A pair of girls lead me down a hall of closed doors, pale green walls, and yellowing linoleum.

The person inside the room at the end is not a girl and wears a different uniform. My details are already assembled into a file sitting open on her desk.

Forty-seven. The number is in bold black at the top. She sees me looking.

_You're a smart girl. Do you know what that is?_

_It's mine. My number_.

 _Yes. We have designated places here. Whatever your past is doesn't matter now_.

Everything I've been thinking about dies in my throat. She isn't much older than Maggie, maybe the same age as Michonne. Her eyes are brown and anxious, and her voice is high without being shrill. I wonder if she has had children.

 _Men and women like me will protect you. You'll be trained and given duties. You'll have shelter and safety and food. And a purpose_.

_What is the purpose?_

_Serving others_. She pauses.

 _The thing to know is this. If you break the rules, nothing is guaranteed. Your protection and your place here. Everything is off the table_.

She locks eyes with me, reaches a hand over the table, and lays it on my bandaged arm. _Is that understood?_


	16. Carol

Eugene is a kid. He's grown, but his refusal to talk reminds me of a wayward child. Glenn and the girl who was with the Governor say they live because of him. Our fragile truce, forged on a cure he does not explain.

 _It's not our job to know the details_ , Abraham says. _We just have to get him to D.C_.

 _You'll excuse my skepticism_ , says Gareth. _This being the first you've spoken of it_.

 _Since you jailed us_ , Abraham counters.

We're wasting time, and I see Daryl sense the absence among us. His eyes keep drifting over. 

 _The peace is temporary_ , Gabriel breaks in. _They come in two weeks. We made a deal for one of your own, the girl named Beth_.

Maggie surges at him, slipping past Glenn, and grasps his shoulders.

 _Carol! What does he mean!_  

I try to say I'm sorry, but it seems cold and futile . . . so I break the truth.

 _We were ambushed in the woods by men he knows. He said we go free if Beth went with them_.

She sinks and buries her face in her hands.  

Gareth speaks. His voice is so quiet and strained, it seems to come from afar.

 _That's not what they'll use her for. They only do that at the beginning, to bring a group to heel_.

She stares at him and says, _How do you know_. But he looks away.

Gabriel says,  _They need girls who are sharp, not broken._

 _For what!_ Rick says.

 _We don't know_. _They visit us and take our supplies. If girls are here, they take a few, too. It buys us peace for a little while_ _. So take your man to Washington and leave this place behind_.

 _ _We don't leave anyone behind__ , Rick says. 

Abraham exhales and scrapes his foot against the ground.

 _The girls are safe. I've seen them, brothers. We've maintained the order and kept most of us alive_ , Gabriel says.

Daryl moves past Rick, past Maggie and Glenn, past Gareth, and holds Gabriel aloft by the neck.

 _You fucking coward. Talking of brothers and saving your ass_ , he growls. _You knew her worth the second you saw her run outside_.

Then he drops him and turns away. Gabriel coughs, runs his hands over his throat, and looks up. _I'll take you there myself_.


	17. Beth

There is quiet here, not quite peace, but a rhythm not unlike the prison. We go to the lab and read the books and practice on a dummy.  The first time I pierce a vein, I want to raise my head and tell the others, _Look!_   Instead, I keep my head down and watch the vial fill.

In bed that night, I wondered how I could feel anything. Then I thought, _I wish Daddy had seen_.  I drew the blanket over my head and let myself cry.  Later, I soaked a cloth in cold water for my eyes, so the swelling wouldn't show. In the morning, my roommate handed me a mirror and another cold cloth before she left the room.

Once a male guard brushed too close to her, and I saw her shrink from his gaze.  When we left the lab, she hurried past me to the room and locked the door.  We sat on our beds and stared at the knob.

 _What if_ , she said.

 _Listen to me_ , I said.   _If it ever happens, you get out of yourself.  You leave your body behind.  It's atoms and cells.  You don't let it break you here_.  I reach up and touch above my left ribs.

After I saw Lori grow big every day but run with us through the woods and labor down into the dirt whenever we had the chance for rest, I knew then God was male.  He told Eve the burden of childbearing was hers, but he never spoke of another sin, the kind only done by men. He never warned the act creating life can be devastation itself.

It's beyond my understanding. I don't know how I would endure.  If I have learned anything, it is that people cannot be controlled, not always, not all the time.  

One morning they take a few of us outside. We are surrounded by buildings and a fenced perimeter. Any guard can overpower any one of us, and what would we face if we made it past them? Hordes and sleepless nights and the prospect of capture again.

But I have also learned the habits of counting gains and cutting losses.  The days of running from the prison have whittled my limbs, and at night I stretch and move them into strength, my roommate watching at first, then joining me.  I number my paces from wall to wall and in the hallway from room to room.  

Once I could not bear the death around us. There was nothing left of my mother who had housed me in her womb and taught me the grace of coexisting.  I told myself I was done with it all and drew the shards across my wrists.

Afterwards, everything I saw took on a brilliance, a too vivid hue against which I sometimes wanted to shut my eyes.  I said nothing of it to Maggie or Daddy while I recovered. I knew they would think I was still unstable and fanciful.  Slowly, everything faded to their natural stain, but I couldn't forget the residue of the fleeting splendor.

I told Daryl I would be gone one day.  I said he was made for the way things are now, for mastering the world outside. But I am made for the world inside, of tending bodies and feinting.  I know this world, and I think it's one I might survive.


	18. Daryl / Gareth

_What's she like._

I ignore him.  He watches me oil the trigger on the Stryker.

_I had a wife.  I met her down here on a roadtrip with friends.  Americana, we said.  Rip van Winkle and the Catskills, all the way down to Dixie. Every night, we'd stop for dinner, go to a bar, take in the local scene._

He sees the look I give him.

_I know. Damn tourists.  Well, one night I get pretty smashed.  I'm driving all day, don't eat anything, and the beers go straight to my head.  I'm sitting there, everything spinning out of control, and I think, I'll just head back to the motel.  Saw some sights and unwound a bit, not a bad day overall._

I test one of the bolts, lay it down, and test another. I set that one down, too.

_And then I see her.  She's standing over there, laughing with friends, playing a shitty game of pool.  Not trying for attention or to impress anyone, just enjoying life.  And I thought, what am I heading back to?  Who's there that really needs me?  Thirty seconds ago, I can barely walk out of the bar, and all of a sudden I'm sharp and cold._

I put another bolt down.  I've already tested the entire bundle, but it gives me something to do while he talks.

_What freezes me is if she gives me a chance.  She'll see through me, everything I'm pretending, all the times I've been weak or petty.  I'm thinking all this, and I haven't even said a word.  I don't feel drunk anymore, but maybe the alcohol takes over, because I go over and say hello.  And I can't believe it, but I wake up the next morning, and her number's written on my hand._

I move the bolts into the holder and start sorting through my bag.  I did this sometimes when we were in the train car, emptying and refilling it.

_I know. Goddamn romance novel. But it can happen like that. I call her everywhere from the road, she flies up to visit me, two months later, I move down here and we go to the courthouse and get married.  Like that.  And it's good, not perfect, but a deep kinda good.  We fight sometimes and, yeah, she sees the flaws in me, but we work through it.  It's the most -- aligned -- I’ve ever felt. All the gears working together._

I pull out her journal.  She tore out pages some nights for fires.  Other times, she would leaf through the ones she’d written on.  I never asked her what they said.

_Then the whole world goes to shit.  We manage to get here, find some others, and start scratching out a living, same as you guys must've done.  I thought we’d be okay.  Maybe not forever, but at least for awhile._

I hold Beth’s journal in my hand and reach for the Stryker.

_One day, the men come.  They take everything.  I stand back and let them have it all and we’re almost done, almost through the worst, when their ringleader stops and says one more thing.  And they head for her._

He closes his eyes, and the water rims around them before tracking down his cheeks. I set the crossbow down, lean against it, and look at him.

_She asked me to end it all.  She said, you be the one, please._

It could be cruel, but I say it because I had not realized the desire Beth held, even after she tried cutting her ties to life.

I tell him, _You_ _made the wrong decision. You shoulda given her the chance if she couldn't see it for herself._


	19. Beth

I come back one day to a bare mattress and missing toothbrush.  I quiet my features when the other girls glance over me at roll call, but I lie rigid at night and stare into darkness -- for the next night and the next, next, next. My skin becomes papery, my gums ache with fatigue, and I stumble through the lessons, envisioning the bed in my room where I collapse in daytime because my nerves can't resist and slacken in the comforting sunlight.

 

The look on his face when I claimed a drink. He thought I would faint after that first glass of moonshine, and it's true I felt not quite myself for a few silvery moments. I had never seen him so uncomfortable as when I explained the rules of the game and thought,  _I can make him do whatever I want_.

But I could not. I could not make him do anything. His rage grenaded and reduced us to embers. We hurled the last of the flames into the cabin and left for the agitated woods. When I asked him about the tracking, I thought he might refuse, but he handed me the Stryker and said, _All or nothin_.

I end here. It's always this memory that carries me to oblivion, but this sleep ends when I see eyes blinking at me. Then I shriek, sit up, and face the young man staring at me from the door.

But he says, _There's been an accident and you are needed_ , and holds open the door.

I run down the hall, down the stairs toward the treatment ward, and see my roommate prostrate with a wounded arm. There is so much blood, and I both despise and bless my life because I have seen before the one cure, which helps me steady my hands and reach out with a careful grip so the doctor can tie the tourniquet.

 

Everyone is fatigued after the procedure, but I head toward the room at the end of the hall. I tell the guard I'm delivering an update.

 _Well?_ says the woman when I'm inside.

 _How did she get bitten?_ I ask.

She narrows her eyes. _Was this what you were instructed to say?_

I shake my head and soften my voice. _I'm confused, you see. I'd like to better understand my place_.

 _Your place is to not ask questions! I believe we had an understanding_.

_You promised us safety. Wasn't that the understanding?_

_And what do you think safety is?_

She stops me for a moment. _No bodily harm. The rest is up to our own selves_ , I say.

_So. Some have safety behind these walls. What about the rest? What about those without resources? It's not so simple. There are too few walls, there is no real safety._

I try to work out what she's saying. _Did she know about it? Did she have a choice?_ I ask.

 _Choice? There is no choice. Here, there is only purpose_.

She bends toward me. _Let me make it clear. You are not the purpose. You are part of a system_.

All I can see is the bloody bone and sinew of her severed limb. The smell of flesh rent open to the air and her cries against the blade.

The words drop from my mouth. _You. Are. Wrong_.

The gun cracks across my face, and I stumble to my knees, tip my head forward so the blood drips onto the floor. Everything contracts to the throb in my cheek. I bite down on my lips so that they also bleed -- so that I cannot -- will not -- cry out.

She opens the door and calls the guard. _Take her away_.


	20. Daryl / Carol

_You shouldn't go_ , I say.

 _Happened on my watch_.  She stands with arms akimbo, her head tilted to one side.

 _Gabriel said no women_.

_What the hell. Scared of my cooties?_

_You know I didn't mean it like that_.

_Let me ask you, do I look like a young miss?_

I shake my head and half-smile in apology.

 _No offense taken.  But two is not enough.  Besides, someone should chaperone_.

 _Ain't no call for that_.

Carol walks forward, and I let her brush away the strands hanging in my eyes.   _I wish this was happier for you_ , she says.


	21. Daryl / Maggie

_I should be going_ , she says.

 _We've been through all this. This run's just scoutin_.

 _I know.  Logically, I know.  But she's my blood.  The last I have_.  She turns away and blinks into the sun.

 _I won't fail her, I swear_.

She faces me and says, _I know that, too_.  


	22. Daryl / Rick

We are a motley and silent entourage. We decamp at every shelter with higher ground and send a few ahead to reconnoiter. We can't do much against stray walkers but take every precaution against hordes.

On the morning we separate, Rick pulls me aside, but I talk first and say,  _I don't trust that guy_.

 _Yours or mine_.

 _Neither_.

 _We’ll be slow-movin.  Could be a good thing, if yours looks like a group job_.

I shake my head and tell him, _Just gettin the lay of the land_.

He nods and says, _Play it safe_.


	23. Beth

I don't know how I get to the recovery ward. They put me in bed and draw the curtains between me and my roommate. I listen to the cadence of her sedated breathing. There's never anesthesia, not even here, just morphine for the aftermath.

 

Those last few days we were together, I got so I could hit the points Daryl marked on the trees. One time, I sighted a squirrel and sailed the bolt clean through it. He whistled and was examining the hit when a rustle in the leaves made us both turn.

 _Just a turtle. Could have terrapin soup tonight_.

I went over to the creature. It pulled in its head and legs right away.

L _et's give him a chance. He can't outrun anyone. It's a miracle he's still alive_.

He shook his head. _All right, bleedin heart_.

 

When I wake, the building is silent. The guards must have taken the others outside. I lie there for a few seconds staring at the ceiling before I realize I can't hear her breathing.

I draw back the curtain, but she isn't there. I slide off the bed and crack open the door, slip outside, and walk down the hallway. I hear a few guards talking behind a closed door and stop to knock when I hear a growl that grows as I approach one of the offices.

Here is how I find her: crouched over a guard with his neck ripped open and his lifeblood dripping from her mouth. When she raises up and turns to me, the bend in her outstretched fingers and the eager forward motion of her gait signals what we’ve all come to recognize, the mindless animation that is never life.

I back away toward the desk. When she is so close I can stare into her blank gaze, I whisper, _I'm sorry_. Then I reach behind me, grab the scissors off the desk, and plunge them into her head.

 

When I've pulled myself together, I go outside and see a guard, the same guy who roused me when they cut off her arm. I point a finger toward the office and say, _She turned._  

But he steps closer.   _She took in me and my sister_. _She said we'd be safe. But she let them have their way with her and left her to die. Same way they did your friend_.

I'm still staring at him.

 _Did you get the gun_ , he asks and points his chin toward the elevator shaft. _We wait. Then we run_.


	24. Daryl

The building doesn't seem occupied. I only see walkers roaming the surrounding grounds.  

I signal that I want to circle the property before getting back to the others, but Gabriel stops and points. My insides compress to a hard pulse when I see the girls led outside. Some wear bandages, but they don't look emaciated or dragging. _C'mon, Beth._

I stay crouched until the last one disappears back inside. Carol nudges me. I need to start moving. I'm getting up when a door scrapes open and the white-blonde sliver of a head emerges.

It'll have to be now and be done right, but it's starting all wrong. I petition the God whose deliverer has brought us here.

_Let me win. Let the meek inherit just once._

 

Her name has almost left my throat when someone drags me back.

 _You want to save her, shut the hell up_ , says Abraham.

I turn and face him standing there with the rest of them. Rick gives me a nod, but Maggie stands away and clenches her fists around the chain-link fence.

For once, I listen to him. We crouch down and tense our limbs and watch. The strangest thing about this world is how hiding can save you so much more than a killing ruckus. For a minute, we listen to feet running across asphalt and walkers rousing outside the fence. Any moment now, we’ll have to announce ourselves. I’m getting to my feet when the gunshot explodes.

Maggie screams, _Beth!_

She’s hunkered down but still moving. Her hands reach for her gun, but her eyes travel over us and meet mine. I don't want to look away.

But Carol curses. I follow her gaze to a window opening on the second floor. I sight the crossbow, let the bolt fly, and reload, but already I have lost time because the second bullet hits the boy before Maggie reaches him and Beth.

Beth’s first words are: _We got to take him!_

 _We gotta get out of here!_ Maggie says, but Beth is trying to hoist the guy up.

I'm already there. I'm covering them, not getting in their way. I say, _You all right? Get behind me!_

Then I realize everyone else has stopped moving. They’re looking beyond us, toward the people lined in front of the hospital doors and aiming weapons at Maggie and me and the two at our feet.

One of them steps forward. A woman in uniform. _My name is Dawn_ , she says.


	25. Beth

I hear Noah taking quick, shallow breaths.

 _Hang on_ , I say, _hang on, we made it this far_. I turn my head and look at Daryl staring back at me. He’s a few feet away, but we don’t move. Any motion could wreak havoc.

 _This is our girl_ , Rick says, _she's one of us_.

 _One of us_ , Dawn says and laughs. _You know as well as I do that means nothing. Yes, we band together against them_. She nods at the walkers growling at the fence. _But you should know those other two gave her up so that they could go free. So much for us_.

Carol flinches and Tyreese buries his face in his hands.

 _Oh no, Dawn_ , I interrupt. _I gave myself up. It was my choice. Me for them, my family. We made a deal_.

 _A deal that you and Noah are breaking_.

Noah yells, _Why don’t you tell them what you’re doing to those girls!_

His words hang in the air. In the silence, I can see the walkers fomenting at the fence, bending it inwards.

Noah says,  _You promised me and my sister. We'd be safe as long as we pulled our weight, then you had your guards take her away in the night. The next time I saw her she was gone, she was nothing. You destroyed her_.

 _Some people take more than they can give_ , says Dawn. _You've been outside. There are people out there doing things you can’t even imagine. Do you play their game or ours?_

 _Ours,_ says Rick.

The air cracks. Something strikes the back of my head, and light flashes around the edge of my vision before I fall to the ground. The earth is shaking. Everything is shaking. I hear shouting and gunfire rapping and my eyes can hardly focus.


	26. Daryl

When the explosion comes, I pull Maggie down and try to cover Beth, but I’m moving too fast and the barrel clips the back of her head. My grip goes off-kilter, and I lose hold of the bow to brace myself against the ground when it comes up to meet me. I still have my gun and squirm on the dirt trying to clear it from the holster, but someone is already standing with my weapon raised.

She embraces it the way I showed, drawing her arm close and balancing the bow on one palm raised up to the sky, her cheek pressed to the stock, the other hand ready for the flight.

 _I get it now_ , she says, and lets go.


	27. Beth

No one moves. Everyone stares at everyone.

Then Daryl rises. The dust clouds around him. I hold out the Stryker. It's so much a part of him, I don't think we've finished until it's back in his hands.

When I thought of him, I always pictured his unflinching eyes, but now I see they are hooded by the fall of his hair. He must have looked like this when we were together, but I don’t have any memory of it. I open my mouth to tell him, but he takes another step. I come to my senses and press forward.

He's carried me before, past the graves to the house and later to the table before the walkers came and everything went to pieces. But I haven't been held by him like this. When he cradles me against his body, I think I am crumbling into a wave that keeps rolling and crashing and breaking through me. He says three words over and over into my ear.

 _You made it_ , he says. _You made it. You made it_.


	28. Rick | Epilogue

_Beth kept telling us about the girls. I knew she wanted more than anything to go back for them, but we had only one explosive and had to leave with the upper hand._

_So I don’t destroy their moment. I don’t remind us of the people doing things we can’t imagine.  I just try to picture what I'll do when those people find us._

**Author's Note:**

> This story reflects my impressions of the characters through the S5 MSF. I stopped watching the show after that.
> 
> I named this story before the "Wolves" ever appeared in S5, because of the ending song in "Still" and because wolves can represent evil in disguise. 
> 
> Thanks for reading.


End file.
